About Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti Gaming OC 11G

Like everytime when new SKUs come out, GIGABYTE comes up with few graphics card variants. For a while, this was observed to be under AORUS sub-branding but surprisingly this is a Gigabyte labeled graphics card. Hmm…

As much as I would like to talk about the RTX 2080Ti, we couldn’t get a review unit of the Founders Edition simply because of how the chipmaker operates itself in India- and how some website owners cater to such needs. I am sure by now people have well caught up with RTX 2080Ti, RTX 2080 and RTX 2070 Founder’s Edition reviews. This review emphasizes on the Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti 11G OC graphics card. It has a triple fan cooling system we’re all familiar with, with two factory overclock profiles. This is in addition to four years warranty (three years + one-year post registration).

Packaging and Contents

Front Packaging

Rear Packaging

Internal Packaging

Contents

The packaging for the Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti is typical of what Gigabyte/AORUS provides for its high-end graphics card over the years, but it really needs to think about incentivizing its customers with real accessories. In today’s times, you would never need those additional PCIe power splitters. Providing a PCIe support bar to hold the graphics card in the system is a more useful accessory. Also, the accessory box is pretty big for two manuals, a disc, a case badge and an accessory you are unlikely to use.

Graphics Card Design

Fan Area

PCB Plate Area

The graphics card has three fan design but has a dark ‘stealth’ look to it, typical to ‘Gigabyte’ branding compared to a flashier AORUS sub-branding. From the PCIe x16 slot, you can easily see the heatsink having contact with the GDDR6 RAM array.

Dimensions

Plain backplate

Left Side/NVLink Area

Right Side/PCIe x16 Slot Area

Front

The Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti is 11.27 inch long, 4.50 inch wide and 1.97 inches thick, making it as a 2.5-slot graphics card, typical of such class irrespective of the manufacturer. Like many graphics cards, the heatsink covers the entire PCB with all three fans pushing air through it for the air to escape sideways.

Remember AORUS cards with a copper plate on the other side of the GPU core, placed on the GPU plate? This doesn’t have any but it would be nice to see some ventilation holes since front case fans will blow the air through it. Whether that will be effective depends on your room and ambient temperatures, the ability of the case to allow air circulation and the number of components inside it. You can see four ends of the copper heatpipes but usually, there is one U-shaped pipe for a set of VRAMs. We’ll see as we progress with this review.

Rear I/O Options

Output covers/Vented I/O

3x DP 1.4a; 1x HDMI 2.0B; 1x USB Type-C

The Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti 11G Gaming OC has one HDMI 2.0b, three DisplayPort’s 1.4a Ready and a virtualLink connector for VR. By default, this is also the first lineup where DVI ports are ditched by AIB partners, unlike the GTX 10 series where only the Founder’s Edition getting the treatment.

What I do appreciate from companies like Gigabyte is that they provide covers for all connectors and outputs, though at this point it is very standard. In a country like India where dust and humidity is a problem, this does its bit to protect the ports.

Cooling System

3x 82mm fans

Like many (and hopefully all of them) AIB units, the Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti Gaming OC does not have any of its 82mm fans spin up unless it hits higher temperature typical of mid-tier load temperatures around 60 degrees C. Even in initial startups, the fans have a very small acoustic footprint. It is only when you crank up the speed manual to 85-90%, you get to hear it through a closed-case PC in a pin-drop silence room. Nothing new.

NVLink and Power Inputs

NVLink

2x PCIe Power Connector

The RTX 2080Ti Founders Edition has a TDP rating of 260 watts with 2x 8-PIN PCIe for additional power delivery. There are 2x 8-pin PCIe power connectors. The Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti Gaming OC 11G card has a TDP rating of 275 Watt TDP with LED indicators on it. The RTX 2080Ti Founders Edition has a TDP rating of 260 watts, also with 2x 8-PIN PCIe for additional power delivery.

Closer Look

GPU Cooling system

Inner Section: PCB and the GPU Cooler

GPU Cooler

Padded Area, Exposed copper pipe surface

Unlike ZOTAC and MSI graphic cards, Gigabyte/AORUS have thermal pads of different sizes. The main issue, however, is that you will have to be very careful when opening/resealing the card as they will stretch and/or tear. Additionally, there are two connectors from the cooler to the PCB. You will see six copper heatpipes having direct contact with the core, with one of the U-shaped heatpipes for one side of the VRAMs.

The Gigabyte RTX 2080Ti uses the TU102 GPU AND 11GB stacks of GDDR6 RAM chips. It is not just another updated graphics card since NVidia’s RTX takes advantage of Windows 10 OCT 2018 update’s real-time ray-tracing update to be used in games, provided the games support them. Till date, there’s only one game and few benchmarks that support RTX. So far, RTX looks like an overpriced novelty. I hope, for everybody’s sake, the developers are more keen on updating currently available games to take advantage of real-time ray tracing feature for games. Obviously, since it is Microsoft’s implementation, at some point AMD Radeon will enable its own labeled ray tracing feature for games. It will be interesting to see if game developers enable it for both GPU makers or just one with who they are associated with for the title.

Note that out of the two connectors, one is for the LEDs and the other is for the fans. The fans will not run if it is connected on the one that’s meant for powering and controlling the LEDs.

Backplate

There are two thermal pads for the other side of the soldered points for the GDDR6. I am not sure why would Gigabyte skip on the third side. These thermal pads are thicker than the ones used internally.

No LEDs here. All of them are on the GPU cooler.

Since this is a factory overclocked card, this is a 300A revision. The actual numbering on the core is TU102-300A-K1-A1. This Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2080Ti has 11 Micron manufactured D9WCW GDDR6 memory, each clocked at 1750 MHz/16 Gbps.

The graphics card has two profiles- Gaming and OC. OC has a higher clock speed.

You can find out more about which cookies we are using or switch them off in settings.

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

disable

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.